Both Arch 32 and Arch 64 install flawlessly on the laptop. For compatibility reasons, I decided to go with Arch 32, given that I had to later recompile the kernel with PAE option turned on, in order to access 4GB of RAM.

Both Arch 32 and Arch 64 install flawlessly on the laptop. For compatibility reasons, I decided to go with Arch 32, given that I had to later recompile the kernel with PAE option turned on, in order to access 4GB of RAM.

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== Install an AUR package manager ==

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First I installed yaourt:

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# vim /etc/pacman.conf

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Add the following repository:

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<pre>

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[archlinuxfr]

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Server = http://repo.archlinux.fr/$arch

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</pre>

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# pacman -Syu

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# pacman -S yaourt

== Install the Realtek wireless card driver ==

== Install the Realtek wireless card driver ==

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The wireles card does not work out of the box, so I had to install the rtl8192se driver from AUR. Note that my card model is 8172, but it does seem to work fine with the 8192se driver.

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The wireless card does not work out of the box, so I had to install the {{aur|8192cu}} driver from [[AUR]]. Note that my card model is 8172, but it does seem to work fine with the 8192cu driver.

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$ yaourt -S rtl8192se

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Install '''networkmanager''' after that. I personally prefer wicd, but apparently it doesn't work well with the Realtek 8192 driver.

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# pacman -S networkmanager network-manager-applet

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Add networkmanager to your DAEMONS in /etc/rc.conf. See bellow for an example of my rc.conf.

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== Install NVIDIA driver ==

== Install NVIDIA driver ==

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Line 70:

# pacman -S xf86-input-synaptic

# pacman -S xf86-input-synaptic

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== Setup permissions ==

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== ACPI ==

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In order to use everything your user must be added to several groups

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You have to tweak acpi a little, otherwise the laptop will randomly freeze. First add the following modules to your rc.conf: ac, battery, button, fan, thermal. Second edit /etc/acpi/handler.sh and under '''battery''' create another case for BAT1) which is the same as BAT0).

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# gpasswd -a $USER wheel

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Here is an example of my /etc/acpi/handler.sh:

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# gpasswd -a $USER network

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{{bc|1=

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# gpasswd -a $USER video

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#!/bin/sh

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# gpasswd -a $USER audio

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# Default acpi script that takes an entry for all actions

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# gpasswd -a $USER optical

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# gpasswd -a $USER storage

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# gpasswd -a $USER scanner

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# gpasswd -a $USER power

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== GNOME ==

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# NOTE: This is a 2.6-centric script. If you use 2.4.x, you'll have to

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# modify it to not use /sys

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I use Gnome, so in order to get everything on your computer accessible to you, you need to execute Gnome with ck-launch-session:

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minspeed=`cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/cpuinfo_min_freq`

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maxspeed=`cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/cpuinfo_max_freq`

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setspeed="/sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_setspeed"

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'''~/.xinitrc'''

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set $*

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exec ck-launch-session gnome-session

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case "$1" in

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button/power)

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#echo "PowerButton pressed!">/dev/tty5

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case "$2" in

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PWRF) logger "PowerButton pressed: $2" ;;

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*) logger "ACPI action undefined: $2" ;;

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esac

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;;

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button/sleep)

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case "$2" in

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SLPB) echo -n mem >/sys/power/state ;;

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*) logger "ACPI action undefined: $2" ;;

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esac

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;;

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ac_adapter)

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case "$2" in

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AC)

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case "$4" in

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00000000)

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echo -n $minspeed >$setspeed

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#/etc/laptop-mode/laptop-mode start

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;;

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00000001)

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echo -n $maxspeed >$setspeed

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#/etc/laptop-mode/laptop-mode stop

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;;

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esac

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;;

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*) logger "ACPI action undefined: $2" ;;

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esac

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;;

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battery)

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case "$2" in

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BAT0)

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case "$4" in

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00000000) #echo "offline" >/dev/tty5

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;;

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00000001) #echo "online" >/dev/tty5

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;;

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esac

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;;

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BAT1)

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case "$4" in

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00000000) #echo "offline" >/dev/tty5

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;;

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00000001) #echo "online" >/dev/tty5

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;;

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esac

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;;

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CPU0)

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;;

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*) logger "ACPI action undefined: $2" ;;

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esac

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;;

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button/lid)

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#echo "LID switched!">/dev/tty5

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;;

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*)

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logger "ACPI group/action undefined: $1 / $2"

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;;

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esac

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}}

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You may also want to add pm-suspend under button/lid) to make your laptop suspend when closed. I particularly do not ever close my laptop, because I use it as a desktop computer.

== Laptop Mode Tools ==

== Laptop Mode Tools ==

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== External Microphone ==

== External Microphone ==

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The external microphone does not work and I have not found a solutions for this problem yet.

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The external microphone works well with OSS, but in order to work with ALSA, you have to add this line to /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf

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== Compiling the kernel with PAE included ==

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If you chose to install Arch 86_64, you can skip this section. This is only for those who installed Arch 32 and would like to access more than 3GB of RAM.

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You have two options:

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# Install kernel26-pae from AUR

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# Recompile the current Arch kernel to turn on the PAE option

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I chose to recompile the kernel, which also gave me the opportunity to remove some modules I won't use.

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=== Install the PAE kernel from AUR ===

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If you chose to install the PAE kernel from AUR:

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# yaourt -S kernel26-pae

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# yaourt -S nvidia-pae

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It will take about an hour for the kernel to compile.

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=== Recompile the current kernel ===

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I compiled the kernel from ABS. Besides turning on PAE, I also did the following changes to my kernel:

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# Removed bluetooth and infrared support (my laptop came w/o any of that)

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# Removed ATA support

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# Removed tablet, touch screen and others

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# Changed the CPU type to Core 2/Newer Xenon

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After you log in to the new kernel, you will have to recompile the '''nvidia''' package too

Removing Windows

I was thinking of keeping Windows in its own partition, but I had trouble with repartitioning the hard disk. Since I don't really use Windows, I ended up deleting all Windows and Toshiba Restore partitions. For some reason cfdisk (my tool of choice) didn't work here, so I had to use fdisk to do that.

Arch Installation

Both Arch 32 and Arch 64 install flawlessly on the laptop. For compatibility reasons, I decided to go with Arch 32, given that I had to later recompile the kernel with PAE option turned on, in order to access 4GB of RAM.

Install the Realtek wireless card driver

The wireless card does not work out of the box, so I had to install the 8192cuAUR driver from AUR. Note that my card model is 8172, but it does seem to work fine with the 8192cu driver.

Install NVIDIA driver

# pacman -S nvidia

This also adds the proper xorg configuration. X starts and works fine right out of the box. It works in 1680x945 right away - no issues here.

Install the Synaptic driver

The mouse pad works, but it has issues. You need to install Synaptic:

# pacman -S xf86-input-synaptic

ACPI

You have to tweak acpi a little, otherwise the laptop will randomly freeze. First add the following modules to your rc.conf: ac, battery, button, fan, thermal. Second edit /etc/acpi/handler.sh and under battery create another case for BAT1) which is the same as BAT0).

You may also want to add pm-suspend under button/lid) to make your laptop suspend when closed. I particularly do not ever close my laptop, because I use it as a desktop computer.

Laptop Mode Tools

I installed laptop-mode-tools, but it didn't seem to improve anything so I disabled it. The battery life of this laptop is less than an hour and there is not much you can do. I use the laptop as a replacement for a desktop computer, so it's always plugged in.

Multimedia Buttons

The volume buttons work out of the box. I am, however, slightly annoyed with them, because they are a little too close to the keyboard and can be accidentally pressed when typing. They can be disabled from the Gnome menu System -> Preferences -> Keyboard Shortcuts

External Microphone

The external microphone works well with OSS, but in order to work with ALSA, you have to add this line to /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base.conf